April 20, 2007 - In breaking news today, it would appear that mega-retailer WalMart has contracted a Chinese manufacturer to produce millions of low-cost HD-DVD players. Though somewhat obfuscated by translation issues and the breaking nature of the news, the current internet consensus suggests that Taiwan based manufacturer Fuh Yuan, in cooperation with TDK, will produce the blue laser drives for 2-million HD-DVD players. Broadcom will reportedly supply the system-on-a-chip decoder, and China Great Wall will handle final assembly. The deal represents around US $100,000,000, and it is reported that a new manufacturing plant has already been opened to fulfill the order.

Speculation suggests the players will arrive at retail in late 2007 and will be priced between $199-299. At such cost, WalMart's HD-DVD drives will be far below the current low of $399 for Toshiba's HD-A20 player, and will look cheap compared to the lowest priced Blu-ray hardware on the market today ($599).

If the current details of the plan prove to be true, WalMart's support of HD-DVD will have a significant impact on the next-gen DVD format war. The American retailer operates on a high-volume, low-margin business plan of market saturation, which is exactly the approach required to drive one format or the other to preeminence.

Stay tuned for updates and confirmation as the story develops.

If this goes through..we can pretty much agree that the war might be coming to an end..I'm pretty sure that everyone who was holding out for Hi-Def experience will get this.

Source please.
By Q42007 is way failry late to have a striking impact. Consdering there is a $500 player already, $300 more over a year isn't exactly a breakthrough. It's pretty damn sweet, but it's not as if Sony couldn't cut down on their players over the course of the same year.

Get ready to get your cheap HD on kids. Wal-Mart just threw down some serious green for a batch of Chinese-made HD DVD players. Just as they brought DVD players down to near-disposable status, their deal for 2 million HD DVD players produced by China's Great Wall corporation will ultimately do the same for hi-def optical. The guts are developed by Taiwan's Fuh Yuan with a touch of help from Japan's TDK. How much? A magical $299, that's how much -- $100 less than the cheapest available HD DVD rig (Toshiba's A2) and half of Sony's $600 BDP-S300 Blu-ray Disc player. It's not clear when we'll see the first units on Wal-Mart shelves, only that the final shipment from the order is expected before 2008 is over.

Update: Pull back the reigns HD DVD fanboys, Akihabara now says that they've made a "huge mistake" with their translation: the original source called it "藍光 HD DVD and 藍光 means Blu-RAY." In other words, Blu-ray HD DVD. Huh? Word to the wise: since both formats use blue lasers, it's best to wait for an English press release before either camp celebrates.

Source please.By Q42007 is way failry late to have a striking impact. Consdering there is a $500 player already, $300 more over a year isn't exactly a breakthrough. It's pretty damn sweet, but it's not as if Sony couldn't cut down on their players over the course of the same year.

I don't think so..if they could they would've matched the price of Toshiba's players a long time ago. Their BD manufacturing costs are high and Sony is really the only one pushing the price down as much as they can and they came down to absolute minimum of $600 player. The $499 player you are refering to is Samsung's first gen Samsung BD-P1000, read "crappy" Blu-Ray player that is being sold as bargain because they couldn't sell them and now a lot of stores have them in stock.

If this deal with Wallmart goes through and people can buy a $199 HD-DVD player..Sony can kiss Blu-Ray goodbye.

Get ready to get your cheap HD on kids. Wal-Mart just threw down some serious green for a batch of Chinese-made HD DVD players. Just as they brought DVD players down to near-disposable status, their deal for 2 million HD DVD players produced by China's Great Wall corporation will ultimately do the same for hi-def optical. The guts are developed by Taiwan's Fuh Yuan with a touch of help from Japan's TDK. How much? A magical $299, that's how much -- $100 less than the cheapest available HD DVD rig (Toshiba's A2) and half of Sony's $600 BDP-S300 Blu-ray Disc player. It's not clear when we'll see the first units on Wal-Mart shelves, only that the final shipment from the order is expected before 2008 is over.

Update: Pull back the reigns HD DVD fanboys, Akihabara now says that they've made a "huge mistake" with their translation: the original source called it "藍光 HD DVD and 藍光 means Blu-RAY." In other words, Blu-ray HD DVD. Huh? Word to the wise: since both formats use blue lasers, it's best to wait for an English press release before either camp celebrates.So no partying yet.

I don't think it's a mistake.. It means Blue light HD DVD as in Blu-laser-light HD-DVD player. There's no way they can make a Blu-Ray / HD-DVD hybrid at $199-$299 price range. It's simply not going to happen. At $199 price the only player they can make is HD-DVD. But let's wait on the english press release.

UPDATE

I just learned on AVS Forums from people who translated the press release it says the following:

The following site is in Chinese. It basically says that Fuh Yuan electronic corporation from Taiwan just built a new factory to manufacture blue laser HD-DVD cores. This core is independently developed by Fuh Yuan, and is a joint project with TDK. The production will be handled by Great Wall corporation in China. An interesting thing is that it mentioned that Fuh Yuan got a two million units order from Wal-Mart, worth USD$100 million. Since Wal-Mart does not sell blue laser core, I assume it would be players. Fuh Yuan's stock will be released by July 12th, and will be publicly traded next March. It is a press release.

Also, It says there could be more orders from Wal-Mart, totaling $300 million for next year. So more is coming

I will never buy anything else from WalMart (started that like a couple of years ago), especially electronics.
200 bucks in more than 6 months, is it THAT inexpensive? If it is, do you look for quality or cheapness?

Personally, I'd prefer paying like 400-500 and to have something that's actually worth it, not just to say "hey I can read HD-DVDs"!